All Dots Connected

CA Dad Would Like Anti-Vaxxers To Stop Trying To Kill His Son

Not only is refusing to get your kids vaccinated aggressively stupid, it’s also exceedingly selfish, a fact anti-vaxxers will have a hard time dismissing now that 6-year-old leukemia patient Rhett Krawitt has come to national attention. His father is asking the school district to require students to get their damned vaccine shots, unless they have valid medical reasons not to. And “dumb parents just don’t believe in vaccines” is not a medical reason.

Why is Carl Krawitt begging the school district for help? Because his son has been undergoing chemotherapy for more than four years, and due to his weakened immune system, he can’t yet have all the standard immunizations that pretty much all the other kids can and should have. So:

Until then, he depends on everyone around him for protection — what’s known as herd immunity.

But Rhett lives in Marin County, Calif., a county with the dubious honor of having the highest rate of “personal belief exemptions” in the Bay Area and among the highest in the state.

Congratulations, anti-vaxxers, you’ve managed to make life a little bit tougher for a 6-year-old battling leukemia, which is not an easy task! It takes a very, very big person to look in the mirror and say, “Y’know what? My personal anti-scientific beliefs are definitely more important than the lives of pediatric cancer patients. Hey, honey, can you come here for a sec and fart in my face? I love farts right in my face.”

Way to go, California, you are the absolute worst right now, and that’s why a dread plague of the measles has descended on the Golden State because, apparently, thousands of you idiots get your medical advice from Drs. Jenny McCarthy and Kristin Cavallari.

There is definitely no way that your collective Neo-Luddism could get any worse than it already is, OH WAIT.

KFSN reported that health officials confirmed that a man in his 40s visited the [Fresno] Community Regional Medical Center’s labor and deliver [sic] floor twice while he was infected with measles. The two visits were said to have occurred on Thursday, January 22 at 9:00 p.m. and Sunday, January 25 at 9:00 p.m […]

Officials said that the man also visited the Build A Bear and Disney stores at Fashion Fair Mall, and a WinCo Foods store on January 25.

We are going to say this one more time, anti-vaxxers, and we’re going to put it in all-caps, so you know this is srs bizns:

JUST BECAUSE YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND HOW SCIENCE WORKS DOES NOT MEAN THAT SCIENCE DOESN’T WORK.

Yr Wonket has no idea how a car’s alternator works, yet we have never claimed that our car’s battery is not charged simply because we are A Idiot. It takes a special kind of arrogance to believe that your own knowledge comprises the limits of human understanding, but then anti-vaxxers are a very special kind of arrogant indeed.

There is, however, a speck of light on the horizon. Down in southern California (pro-tip: call it SoCal and locals will drop their avocado huaraches to punch you in the neck!), two school districts have declared that they’re sick and tired of being sick and tired. Here’s Reuters explaining how exurban L.A. is rapidly becoming California’s most-sane mega-city.

A California high school barred dozens of non-vaccinated students from school on Wednesday over concern that a classmate may have contracted measles in a rare outbreak of the highly contagious disease that began at a Disneyland resort last month.

The order, which affects 66 students at Palm Desert High School near the resort community of Palm Springs, marks at least the second time a California school has prohibited non-vaccinated students from classes since the outbreak began.

Earlier this month, a school in the Los Angeles suburb of Huntington Beach ordered non-vaccinated children to stay home until this Thursday.

Palm Desert High School educates nearly 2,000 students, which means that even in this pocket of relative sanity, more than 3 percent of the student body is unvaccinated. Someday, California, you’re going to have to explain to your grandkids how all this happened — though, let’s be honest, the measles will probably take care of the whole “grandchildren” thing for you.

Dan Weber is a writer based in Washington, D.C. When he is not freelancing for Wonkette, he serves as a copy monkey at an ad agency and cranks out tracts for the never-ending propaganda war we call American politics.